Microsoft Encarta 2006 marketing

With the release date only a few weeks away, I'm surprised to find very little advanced information about the product. One interesting thing that I have noticed is that the package now contains both CD's and DVD's. This makes a lot of sense, since it is much cheaper to include the extra disks in the package than to come up with a different package that differs in just the disks.

It looks like there is some price changes too. The 2005 version sells for $100 Cnd. The 2006 version sells for $80. That sounds great -- less money for more stuff. But the marketing department is one step ahead. The new Microsoft Student 2006, which includes Encarta and more stuff, sells for $120. So does one pay less money for the old stuff which will be psychologically viewed as junk because now one can pay more money for newer stuff. Clever those marketing people.